Borges, ahijado de Chesterton

Abstract

The pairing that permits Borges’ association with Chesterton moves from the Argentine’s private experience to critical interpretation through the intermediary of meaning-making. The meaning of the pair, Borges/Chesterton, results from the overlaying of the meaning, precursor by the heir who claims the legacy of delicious, quirky humor and vast, real possibilities. This remarkable insight, obvious in his stories, sets a logic for the fantastic. Imagination, in its various intellectual musings, establishes the limits to possibility. The unimaginable, ipso facto, cannot be possible. What remains, in all its vastness, is the world that Chesterton and Borges share.